An Unkept Promise
by RoyxRizaFan
Summary: Johnny remembers a deal he made with Tapp before he was killed. Written for the Black Order Science Division FC at dgraymananime forums.


Johnny yawned, taking a moment to place his head down on the desk. He was even more tired than usual today – he had spent almost all of the previous night sketching out a new design for the exorcists' uniforms, and hadn't slept much. Once he got into doing something like that, he couldn't stop until he was finished. As much as he liked the outcome of his designs, it certainly hadn't been worth the lack of sleep. The day seemed to drag on even longer than usual now, as he practically counted down the minutes until he would be able to leave.

He still had a long way to go.

"Johnny, wake up!" he heard Reever shout from behind a large stack of papers. "You're no where _near _finished! I need those papers filed by the end of the day!"

Johnny groaned, barely stirring. He was used to the Section Leader's yelling, and could practically sleep through it by now.

"If you have a problem with all the work, bring it up with our stupid boss," Reever muttered. "Maybe if Komui was a little bit more responsible for his work, we wouldn't have to do this all the time."

Johnny couldn't blame him, though – all this paperwork was nearly impossible to complete. Things had even been harder recently, due to their lack of co-workers since…the incident. Johnny cringed, doing his best not to think too far into it.

"Johnny, get up!" Reever called again, nearly swimming through the papers to get over to his desk. "Come on, I really need everyone to put in their best effort today! How's this sound: if you can at least finishing the filing by the end of the day, I'll play some chess with you. I know how much you like that, and you haven't had the chance in a while. Okay?"

Johnny knew that Reever was trying to help, but his mention of _chess _only made things worse. He sat up only for the purpose of shaking his head. "No, that's the last thing I want to do. I'll never play chess again."

Reever sighed. "That still doesn't change the workload, Johnny."

With a soft groan, he got up and set back to his work, trying his best to stay awake. As he began to place the papers into the filing cabinet, he wondered for a second why he even put up with such a job.

"Chess," he muttered to himself. "As if."

His mind wandered up to his room, where his dusty chessboard sat, untouched. The last person he had played with had been Suman, but it should have been someone else…

---

It had been a day quite like this one, with Johnny overloaded with filing. The sole exception if that he had had an extra set of hands to help him – Tapps'. They had been playing one of their games to get their mind off the work as they placed the papers in their proper spaces.

"I'd rather be on a beach in Florida," Tapps said once it was his turn. "Last time the exorcists went to America, they came back and told me how nice it was there."

"I'd rather be in outer space!" Johnny said with a laugh. "Can you imagine how cool that would be? You could hitchhike with _aliens_!"

Tapps thought for a moment before saying, "I'd rather be skiing."

Johnny laughed his answer off. "You can't ski!"

"I know, but I ran out of ideas. We've been playing this for _hours_."

He was about to respond with 'I know', but a large, long yawn cut him off.

"You were up again, weren't you?" Tapps groaned. "Designing uniforms?"

"I was _trying _to, but my mind was completely _blank_," Johnny explained. "I can barely keep my eyes open now."

"No one can actually tell, so don't worry about that. It's your turn, by the way."

Johnny sighed. "Hm…" He placed another paper into the cabinet, concentrating before saying, "You know what I haven't done in a while that I'd like to do?"

"Date?" Tapp guessed.

Johnny glared at him. "No! Play _chess_."

"Chess?"

"Yeah! How about it?"

"How about what?"

"Want to play chess with me after work?"

Tapps shook his head violently. "Oh, God, no! I can't play to save my life!"

"Neither could Suman," Johnny pointed out with a smirk. "Come on, I'll teach you! You'll get good at it!"

"Nope, not happening."

"It'll be fun!"

"I'll pass!"

"Come on!"

"No!"

"Why not?"

Tapps groaned, shoving a stack of papers at Johnny. "I'll make a deal with you. I'll play it with you _tomorrow_, so long as you finishing the filing for me. I have some documents to bring up to Komui."

Johnny accepted the papers, nodding. "It's a deal, all right! You'd better keep your end of the deal, though, or I'll make you sorry!"

"I will," Tapp assured him, climbing over a mountain of papers to get out of the room.

Johnny turned back to the filing, wondering if it had been a fair deal. It _had _been a while since he'd played chess. He smiled silently to himself, thinking of how much fun it would be to try to teach Tapp. They hadn't done anything but work recently, and they both needed a break. It should be fun.

It was certainly something to look forward to.

---

Johnny snapped out of his memory, quickly getting back to work before Reever noticed he was slacking off again. Tapps had never kept his end of the deal after all, but it hadn't been his fault. He had never had the opportunity to play chess, let alone do anything else, after the next morning. Johnny blinked back tears, trying once again not to think too deeply into it. It felt wrong to forget about Tapp, though.

Since then, his chessboard had sat, collecting dust. Johnny hadn't found the desire to look at it, let alone play with anyone. It had been hard enough when he lost Suman. Now Tapp was gone, too.

As he placed the last papers into the cabinet, he wondered if avoiding the problem was really the best thing to do.

He leapt to his feet, dodging an avalanche of papers as he made his way over to Reever.

"I think I'll take you up on your offer," he called, unable to walk any further.

"Offer?" Reever asked.

"Chess," Johnny clarified, making his way back over to his desk. "I want to play chess after work."

"I don't have any idea where my board went," Reever admitted.

Johnny smiled. "Don't worry. We can use mine."


End file.
